secovssulcoConfusable pair

Quick tell: seco is a adjective, sulco is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“seco” is an adjective and “sulco” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#4,763
“seco” frequency rank
#45,610
“sulco” frequency rank
50373
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature seco sulco
Definition sem água ou humidade; enxuto; árido rego

Where the eye mixes seco and sulco

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 3 letters in sequence.

4 ch
seco
5 ch
sulco

Look-alike desk: seco vs sulco

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: seco is /ˈse.ku/ while sulco is /ˈsuɫ.ku/. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 1 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (adjective vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 50373, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

seco is recorded at frequency rank #4,763, classified as anadj, pronounced /ˈse.ku/. sulco is at rank #45,610, tagged as anoun, pronounced /ˈsuɫ.ku/.

Glosses for this pair are partially populated in our dataset, but the full side-by-side definitions above should still guide you to the right choice.

With a confusion score of 50373, this pair ranks #14,600 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs - among the most confusable pairs.

Orthographic DNA of seco vs sulco

Shared letters: cos. Private to "seco": e. Private to "sulco": lu.

"seco" · 4 letters · shape CVCV  ·  "sulco" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • secoesco · sceo · secco · seoc · sseco
  • sulcosluco · ssulco · suclo · sulcco · sullco · suloc · uslco

Frequently Asked Questions

Do "seco" and "sulco" mean the same thing in a sentence?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "seco" is an adjective and "sulco" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Which is more common, "seco" or "sulco"?
"seco" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #4,763 in our Portuguese list, against #45,610 for "sulco". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Eye-level mix-up between "seco" and "sulco" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "seco" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "sulco" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #14,600 of 75,631 scored Portuguese confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "seco" and "sulco" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "sueño vs sulco". Nearby pair
  • Recorded mistypes exist for at least one side of this pair, useful when a spell-checker or OCR lands on the wrong form. See mistypes

Confusion rank #14,600 of 75,631 scored Portuguese pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list